


Lost on the Subway

by strangelock



Series: 30 Day Valelock Challenge [1]
Category: Dark City (1998), Sherlock (TV), The Prisoner (1967), Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Angst, Asexual Sherlock, Christmas, Gen, Memory Alteration, Post-Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-06
Updated: 2013-12-06
Packaged: 2018-01-03 15:26:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1072069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangelock/pseuds/strangelock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by Welcome to Night Vale, episode 29, Subway and prompt #7, Lost and/or Stranded from wintergrey's 30 Day OTP Challenge for the Fluff-Impaired.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost on the Subway

Digital time blinks.

The train shifts and settles into the moment created with each blink. Purpose incarnate. Leaves behind an echo joyfully chasing itself through the tunnels left empty. 

Only the echo gets to explore the tunnel's hidden places behind the closed eyes of time. The train moves too quickly for this. 

The tracks conduct the train in military fashion below the streets and pavement, which cannot conduct, they can merely suggest, and the result is convenience-inspired chaos, frustrated efficiency, and untethered echoes left to dissipate above the froth.

Digital time blinks. Says '7:43.'

Time enough to get a good coffee before his shift at the clinic, John thinks, collapsing into the carriage seat. His breathing is deep and satisfying, almost back to normal. He feels a bit effervescent with his blood still rushing and his muscles relaxed.

_{knock … knock … knock}_

He is already forgetting the knocks that echo in the quiet places of his mind that would remind him about answering the door, about the summons, how he rushed to get to the train — not late, but urgent — to find him...

Instead his mind is filled to the brim with thoughts and memories and ideas which softly jostle each other with each gentle rock of the carriage as it picks up speed.  One sparks on the next, so that his mind is never focused on any one thing for very long. And yet, despite the brevity, each is bursting with crisp details, with slants of light catching the drifts of dust in the still air; with kinks in his socks, trapped in standard issue boots, announcing their presence with every step; with the rattle of dishes on the tabletop, when the door is slammed… As if compelled to memorize each memory anew, he cannot pull away from the tide drawing him to the next and the next and the next… He remembers.

_{pop … pop … pop)_

The three-volley salute calling his attention inexorably towards the cemetery next door...

Getting tagged by Jeremy as a result of his inattention on the playground...

How many times he played silly games to the sound of funerary bagpipes...

How many times he held the riffle and fired the blanks to say goodbye to a fellow soldier to the sound of innocent, playful shrieks from the day care center beyond...

The sound of his father's boots marching towards his door to say goodbye...

The silence of his mum's grey tom padding close to investigate the new born cousin, held in his small arms...

Sherlock's smile as he griped his now redundant cane...

And Sherlock… falling from St. Barts… calling him 14 months later… not dead…looking right at him, through him, not knowing him…

Ping. Ping. Ping.

‘Now approaching: Grove Park Station. Next stop: Old Town.’

Digital time blinks. Only two minutes have passed.

John rips himself away from the hypnotic comfort of the carriage, holds fast to the renewed urgency of the summons he almost forgot. It’s like trying to hold a snarling, clawing cat. He waits for the train to depart. The further it gets, the clearer he feels. He waits for his internal clock to make sense of those two endless minutes; fails.

Digital time blinks and Sherlock appears at his side.

This time, Sherlock knows him, remembers. He’s getting better at shaking the imprints, but these times are still rare and precious. Undeniable. A gift and a punch to the gut in one. Sherlock raises one finger to his own lips, brushes a thumb through the wetness on John’s face and then pulls him close, backing them silently against the nearest column.

They watch one of Mycroft’s blank children, trailed by a small army of roaches, pass by, oblivious. Tension fades along with the susurrus of thousands of tiny feet and John shifts until his ear is right over Sherlock’s heart and breathes in relief and Ralph’s fabric softener and honey.

_{thump … thump … thump}_

Digital time blinks and is forgotten.

Sherlock runs one hand through John’s hair to his neck, leaves it there. Careful, so as not to stir the echoes, he says, ‘I want to show you something.’

They jump down from the platform and leave the light of Grove Park Station behind. Hand in hand, Sherlock guides him unerringly through the vast tunnel system partially occupied by Night Vale’s new subway. Caves, John realizes, ancient and dark, clean and cold. 

Sherlock eventually stops, shuts off the almost ineffectual flashlight, doesn’t let go of John’s hand. The sound of distant dripping reaches him first. Then a faint glow shimmers to life here and there. Finally some of the inky darkness materializes into mammoth columns —stalagmites. It’s a cavern. 

They settle at the edge of a still pool, glowing with the bioluminescence that softly illuminates it. 

After a while, John prompts: ‘What was it this time? You remember yourself.’

‘It was the train. The imprints… Most people aren’t getting off because the memories are theirs, _really theirs_ , and they’re so… vivid.’

‘They are.’ John hadn’t considered. HIs memories have been his own the whole time.  Sherlock doesn’t know he isn’t Sherlock while his imprint is intact, doesn’t know John. It all crashes through him during moments like these, when he is himself again; all those memories of talking with John, recalling the look on John’s face… John swallows, breathes in the mineral-rich air, looks only at Sherlock.

‘Happy Christmas, John.’ Sherlock is looking up, eyes flitting, softly smiling at the sound of the echo ricocheting, finding every crack and crevasse and filling it with his voice.

Tightness blooms in John’s chest at the words; it’s weeks yet before Christmas. They both know it.

‘Happy Christmas, Sherlock.’

_{drip … drip … drip}_

**Author's Note:**

> This ficlet is part of a larger fusion that I haven’t published yet. In short, it puts John and Sherlock, post-Reichenbach, in Dark City—in this case, Night Vale—and the Strangers—Hooded Figures—imprint people with new lives and memories as they see fit. Sherlock is one of these people. John is not. Mycroft is (working with) the vague yet menacing government agency. A creepy, characterless replica of 221b Baker Street was built in Night Vale for John and Not-Sherlock to inhabit. I publish this mostly to hold myself accountable to practicing with smallish, semi-contained fics.


End file.
